Into each life some rain must fall (or something like that)

...and life, which is what happens to you while you’re making other plans, requires me to be away from Blogland for a few days.

Not to worry, though. I shall return, though perhaps not in the way General Douglas MacArthur returned to the Philippines:

In the meantime,

I know it’s hard to believe, but...

...once upon a time the leaders of Her Majesty’s gubmint were real people with crooked teeth, pot bellies, fallen arches, and the like. They looked like this:

and this:

and, yes, even this:

But all of them looked like actual, living, breathing members of the species homo sapiens. People like you and me. People with aches and pains. People with flaws.

Here are two more of fairly recent vintage:

Ordinary-looking blokes, both of them. People you might pass on the street or with whom you might share a pint at the local pub or beside whom you might sit at a soccer match.

But something very strange has happened. The current leaders over there across the pond in you-know-where look more like Hollywood actors. They are pretty boys, perfect specimens stamped out with a cookie cutter, almost artificial in their sameness. The effect is Stepford-wives-ish.

Here, for example, are random British leader #1:

random British leader #2:

and random British leader #3:

...all of whom just happen to have ascended to the highest, most powerful political offices in the land.

Uncanny, isn’t it?

And more than a little bit scary.

Because if the mannequins have already taken over, can the robots be far behind?

I have realized just this minute where I have seen their like before. It was the sinister children in the 1960 film, Village of the Damned.

Let me just say in closing, dear reader, that in this world of ordinary people, extraordinary people, I’m glad there is you.
Yes, in this world of overrated treasures and underrated pleasures, I’m so glad there is you.

[Editor’s note. I would like to thank, in the order of their appearance in this post, Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Harold Macmillan, John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, George Osborne, Nick Clegg, David Cameron, the sinister children in Village of the Damned, and the lyrics of Jimmy Dorsey and Paul Madeira. --RWP]

Well, that didn’t take long.

Anonymous has struck.

The following comment appeared on one of my older posts today, and Blogger kindly put it in my e-mail for moderation.
I deleted it, but before I did I decided to copy it and show it to you because I found myself chuckling at the absurdity of it all.

The writer obviously never sat through a course called English as a Second Language (ESL). Or if the writer did, he or she must have failed the course miserably.

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Really, Anonymous, I don’t want to synergy this kind of dietary supplement, although being bound to shell out the very last little extra fat is tempting, especially since your product does not make me feel ravenous and enables me to discard every one of the extra load out of my system.

Thanks, but no thanks. I will not set the buy. I will not acquire this specific. I will have to nourish all of my technique and trigger a bout of optimistic vitality some other way. Whatever product or method I decide to use, I do hope it will enable a tougher and tight body to switch my own prior pulpy size.

I shall look for another proper procedure for my weight loss that can easily provide a sumptuous reduction in bodyweight. I pray that all my endeavours do not pass away an organic demise.

Regarding your claim that just a couple pills in order to pop and I can decline kilos quickly, if only it were that easy. But I will certainly continue to try to induce off of the volume from the bulging belly.

Lastly, Anonymous, whether my bags appear to move is none of your business.

I have taken my life in my hands

...and, after reading Jinksy’s friend Hilary’s post containing some simple instructions, have -- with fear and trembling -- turned off Word Verification on this blog.

I think the Blogger people probably mean well. They are only trying to separate the real human beings from the automatic spammers, but their efforts are having the unintended opposite effect, that of removing real human beings from the process altogether. If something is too difficult, or really isn’t but is perceived to be, or even if it is just a little bit inconvenient, many people simply quit trying.

I say this to our shame.

***Observes a moment of silence here for what strange creatures we humans are***

But since what I’m after is comments, more and more comments from more and more people, I have taken the plunge.

I am now in free-fall mode.

Please be gentle.

Pick one and give reasons for your choice

Today in the United States is Presidents Day or President’s Day or Presidents’ Day.

Follow the instructions in the title of this post.

For extra credit, and without looking, name all 44 presidents in order and their terms of office. An example not only would be but is, or was, George Washington (1789 - 1797). Before you complain, remember that I could have asked you to name all 50 states and the year each one entered the union and to tell why you think Puerto Rico should or should not become the 51st state.

Readers who are not Americans (you know you you are), please name as many U.S. presidents as you can, from memory, and report the number in the comments. A helpful hint: Benjamin Franklin, Henry Ford, Michael Jackson, and Whitney Houston were never president. Also, write a paragraph explaining why your country should have a Prime Ministers (or Prime Minister’s or Prime Ministers’) Day if it doesn’t, and why it shouldn’t if it does.

Your next reading assignment, class, is here.

Scott who?

This is not Santa Claus in his younger days.

It is not Peter Ustinov or Burl Ives or any other youngster aspiring to success in show biz.

This is Scott Fahlman.

Scott Fahlman.

Scott Fahlman is the person who may or may not have been the first to suggest the use of :-) as a smiley-face emoticon and :-( as a frowny-face emoticon in September 1982, as careful readers of this blog learned from a link in a comment left by Katherine on an earlier post.

When I was a lad, we didn’t have emoticons.

When I was a lad, we had slinkies and 45-rpm records and Brownie Hawkeye cameras.

When I was a lad, well, see for yourself (2:42).

One thing is sure, if one becomes the ruler of the Queen’s navy, one can not also be the very model of a modern major-general (5:00).

There is method in my madness: My purpose in including the links to Gilbert and Sullivan in today’s post was to change any and all artificial emoticons among the members of today’s audience into real smiles.

Now aren’t you glad you dropped by?

And I made you forget all about Scott Fahlman.

Happy Day After Valentine’s Day Day

...which also happens to be the birthday of my long-deceased father-in-law, Dhimitri Kuçi, who changed both his first and last names when he became a naturalized citizen of the United States, so don’t bother trying to find him in Facebook or any other social networking or genealogical collection. Pop would have been 117 today.

I also had a friend named Ernie (well, Ernest) who was born on Valentine’s Day, so his parents gave him the name Valentine as his middle name. Ernie is gone now too.

But to those of you who remain and are reading this (for you students of mathematics, one group is a subset of the other), I want to wish you a very happy Day After Valentine’s Day Day.

Five or six years ago I gave Mrs. RWP a Dachshund puppy for Valentine’s Day. We named the puppy Rudolph Valentino and called him Rudy for short. Rudy and I had huge disagreements over which one of us was going to be the alpha male in the house. After about three months, Mrs. RWP said, “One of you has to go and I’ve had you longer” and chose me to stay. So Rudy went away to live with three other doggies of his breed, where they may still be fighting over which one is the alpha male.

Last night, Mrs. RWP and I stayed home and ate leftover meat loaf because we didn’t relish fighting the crowds at the restaurants, but we did go out the night before (sorry, I neglected to wish all of you a happy Day Before Valentine’s Day Day, my bad) to a Mexican restaurant called Viva Mexico! The exclamation point is part of the name of the restaurant, not my own excitement at having been there, so I suppose I should have written “Viva Mexico!.” but I’m not sure.

I also bought Mrs. RWP a card and a pink hydrangea plant which will turn blue when we plant it later in the Georgia red clay underneath our bedroom window. I hasten to add that I am talking about the Georgia red clay outside our bedroom window. There is no Georgia red clay, or very little, inside our bedroom window. Also, we plan to plant only the hydrangea plant, not the plant and the card.

If you don’t mind my asking and you don’t mind sharing, how did you spend your Valentine’s Day evening? [Editor's note. And remember, this is a family-friendly, G-rated blog. --RWP]

If you do mind either one of those, just ignore my nosiness and try to have a very happy Day After Valentine’s Day Day.